On Tue, Oct 18, 2022 at 11:54:49AM -0700, Linus Torvalds wrote: > I think we have one major interface that is string-based (apart from > the obvious pathname ones and the strings passed to 'execve()'). > > It's 'mount()' (and now fsconfig() etc), and it's string-based mainly > because it has that nasty "arbitrary things that different filesystem > may need for configuration"). And it has some nasty logging model > associated with it too for output. > > But no, we absolutely do *not* want to emulate that particular horror > anywhere else. This might ruin your day, but FYI, Netlink [...did you already run off screaming at the mention of Netlink?...] Netlink has the whole "extack" extended acknowledgement mechanism, in which netlink replies can and do contain error strings. Grep the kernel for NL_SET_ERR_MSG and you'll see a bunch of these. (And as you suggested, I wouldn't be surprised if some bad userspaces parse them.) Jason
